BSO announces new timpanist, four other orchestra appointments

Beginning in September with the start of the 2013-2014 season, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra will officially welcome James Wyman as principal timpanist, succeeding the late, much-loved Dennis Kain, who served in that position for 46 years.

Three other orchestra newcomers have been announced: Lisa Bergman as second horn; Nathaniel Hepler as second trumpet; Rebekah Newman as fourth chair viola. And violist Karin Brown, who joined the BSO in 2001, is moving on up. She won an internal audition for assistant principal viola.

Wyman's credits include principal timpanist with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, acting principal timpanist with the Reading Symphony and Erie Philharmonic.

Bergman has been a member of several orchestras, including the San Antonio and Knoxville symphonies. Hepler's resume includes principal trumpet with the Sarasota Opera Orchestra. Newman has served as principal violist with the Akron Symphony, Charlotte Symphony and Erie Philharmonic.

A jolting cupful of Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" for your Midweek Madness break. I especially like the bits of choreography, as well as what I gather is a Finnish folk song that these guys from the Fabulous Backstrom Brothers Show toss into the mix.

Some pianists become narrower -- in terms of repertoire, that is -- as they grow older. They stick contentedly with, say, a Mozart-Beethoven-Schubert diet, or maybe just big helpings of Rachmaninoff and Liszt. More disturbingly, some young keyboard players restrict themselves to a few composers...

Baltimore arts patrons Robert E. Meyerhoff and Rheda Becker have donated $1 million to the Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University to establish scholarships for students of near-legendary pianist and veteran Peabody faculty artist Leon Fleisher.